


at your pleasure, Princess

by fernlyan_epho



Category: Dune - All Media Types, Dune Series - Frank Herbert
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character development!, F/M, childhood acquaintances to lovers?, references to past dubcon, so it's still T but I did wonder, this is pretty vulgar but it's mostly a series of conversations, uh.. let me know if i should tag anything else?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:28:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26572993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fernlyan_epho/pseuds/fernlyan_epho
Summary: Paul spares Feyd-Rautha for seemingly no purpose, except to suffer in isolation and boredom.Irulan comes for a surprise visit.
Relationships: Irulan Corrino/Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen
Comments: 11
Kudos: 19





	1. Chapter 1

The thing about hedonism is that, done well, it’s a very active lifestyle. This is most apparent from a physical perspective. Feyd had been a competitive fighter, after all, and success in that arena required constant training. In fact, the only thing he did more than fight was fuck, which once again contributed to his overall physical vitality.

But it was mentally active too. Parties and feasts and revels—even those one couldn’t remember due to drink and drug and the fact they were all the fucking same—were things which one _did_. There was talking and dancing and fighting and fucking and playing and a host of other verbs in progressive tense.

Moreover, being a political power and being a hedonist required a carefully-created schedule. If he did another shot, at what time would he be sober enough to plan? How quickly could important conversations be concluded so that he could give into whatever fashion drug was making the rounds? Could he slip down to the slave girls and get back before the reading of some report? Truly, hedonism required a certain level of industriousness.

This was a long way of saying that Feyd was bored. He slept as long as he liked, kept up his training exercises, read a little, sketched a little, occasionally masturbated.

A simple life of pleasures. Not good old-fashioned hedonism. 

Atreides was keeping him nicely in a large room with a large window constructed in a way he couldn’t break. Feyd hadn’t spared more than a day planning an escape, anyway. Paul may have spared him but that Fremen bitch at his side wouldn’t think twice about harvesting his organs for water, or whatever atrocities were common on this planet, and she wasn’t alone in that sentiment. So leaving merely attempting to leave this apartment was more than he thought he could fight through. He had no hope of bribing his way out, either, having lost all power and money. He had thought about killing himself, but he’d hate to make anyone happy. Additionally, he wasn’t too keen on whatever, and whoever, might be waiting for him in the hereafter. 

His only visitors were a cycle of guards who gave him food and a cycle of maids who took care of his linens. He had found a bit of joy in how frightened they all were of him, making flirtatious smiles and watching them rush out flustered, but this grew old in about three days, and now three weeks in, he had the rather disconcerting thought of actually learning their names.

He expected Paul to come by, but Paul hadn’t yet. He frankly thought this to be rude, and blamed his Fremen woman again for the lapse in hospitality. Surely Paul Atreides, little Landsraad babyface, felt some obligation to his nonconsensual guest.

“Prisoner” seemed incorrect, somehow. 

There were other visitors who wouldn’t have surprised him. Hawat to have closure. Jessica to tell him off. The Fremen leader to gloat. The Fremen bitch to kill him. He could even come up with reasons why the little freakish toddler would come to see him.

He did not anticipate Irulan.

She came to visit in near-full regalia: a golden tiara woven into her hair, a heavy high-collared cloak with a finely-embroidered Corrino crest, a luscious taffeta gown in Atreides green. Her wrists and hands were wrapped in thin golden bracelets which seemed to twist up her arms, undoubtedly constructed to her exact measurements.

The familiarity of her imperial fashion was contradictorily strange, as it so clearly didn’t belong. Feyd had given up on his wool uniform long ago, accepting resentfully the light linen fashions more fitting to Arrakis. He noted the sweat forming on her brow and her lip. Stubborn girl.

Happy people weren’t stubborn.

“Baron Harkonnen,” she addressed him with a slight nod.

“You address me with an expired title.”

“It’s your title, is it not?”

“Then maybe I am an expired man.” It wasn’t his best wit, but he’d been stuck without decent conversation for so long. And Irulan permitted herself a polite smirk, anyway.

He rose from his perch on the windowsill and walked over to properly greet her. She extended her hand and he took it and bowed. It was the precise level of formality appropriate for a baron to an empress, but with some details which were rather romantic in connotation.

“Be careful with your implications; I’m a married woman.”

“Old habits die hard, Your Highness.”

“Regarding women, or just regarding me?”

“I remember my visits to Kaitain fondly.”

Irulan called for coffee to be brought, and the two sat down. One of the attendants moved to serve, but Irulan dismissed her and prepared coffee herself. Feyd recognized it for what it was, a demonstration of transparency. He supposed it was only fair that she prove she wasn’t going to poison him, though of course he knew she wasn’t.

“Best to be informal, at this juncture, I believe.” They shared a polite smile. “You know, Feyd-Rautha—may I call you so?—I am surprised I did not think to visit you sooner. I’m still waiting for Lady Jessica to approve my retinue, and for them to arrive will be another week, at least.”

“So you are lonely.”

“And you are the person in the palace whom I have known the longest. Would you like cream?”

Feyd nodded. “At your pleasure, Princess.”

“Irulan, please. We have known each other for years, after all.”

“Well, Irulan, it is good to hear that my visits were remembered, if not fondly.”

Irulan poured the cream rather than comment. Feyd wondered if there was any use to the repartee he found himself performing, but wasn’t sure he knew any other way to navigate this interaction. Irony seemed the only genuine course.

“Things are very different now.” She was quiet as she said this, and Feyd thought she was suppressing a sigh. “And yet I am still a gilded bird in a gilded cage.”

“You mistake the situation, Irulan; I believe you came to visit me in my cage.”

Irulan laughed this time, still delicate and carefully-timed but believable. “Yes, we live similarly, I imagine. Every need attended to, if only to keep us from being a bother by asking for anything.”

“Ah yes, but for the key difference that when you’re lying in bed waiting for Atreides to fuck you, he actually shows up.”

Irulan stilled. Feyd first thought his misstep was vulgarity, but surely Irulan had been prepared for that, not only from him but from a lifetime of crude courtiers. No, this was an uncertainty of some other form. With a realization, he laughed softly.

“He does fuck you, doesn’t he?”

Irulan’s silence said enough. 

“He doesn’t fuck you?” Now this was interesting. Feyd sat up taller, and couldn’t help grinning in some gleeful confusion.

“There were... formalities... on the wedding night.”

“Was your father there?”

This time, silence was a confirmation. Feyd laughed rather sadistically. He noted it with a bit of disappointment. He didn’t think of himself as unhinged.

“Excuse me, Princess, Irulan. I do not mean to laugh at your expense. But it seems rather ungallant of your husband to fuck you only once, and for your father’s pleasure.”

Seemingly unfazed, Irulan sipped at her coffee. “A princess does not marry on account of gallantry. Surely you remember how unimportant you were during your visits to Kaitain. The matter of my marriage is politics.”

“On the contrary, I remember practicing for weeks so that you’d think my dancing was suitable. I was to be at my most-gallant for you. But that is not the point.”

“What is the point, Feyd-Rautha?" 

“I’m sure I don’t know.” He brought the coffee spoon to his full, impishly-smiling lips and cleaned it rather impolitely.

“Let’s hope that ignorance isn’t covering for malice,” Irulan responded, not breaking eye contact, “or other unsavory motives.”

“My apologies, Princess.” He meant it, in some fashion.

“I am technically Empress now. But again, you may call me Irulan.”

“Sick of deferential servants tripping over themselves for _your Majesty_?”

“I have come to realize it is always said mockingly. For reasons you have already discovered.”

Feyd indulged himself a few seconds of fantasy, wondering about the logistics of her wedding night. How close had her father sat? Was Lady Jessica obligated to be there as well? Or the other Reverend Mother? What of her clothes? Did she lay there fully clothed or was more visible proof required? He would have loved to see how Atreides had handled himself. Looking at him and the Fremen woman, Feyd had always assumed he was rather passive, in the scheme of things, which obviously wouldn’t do for the _formailities_ , as Irulan had called them.

His blood was rushing a little more than appropriate for an afternoon coffee, so he swallowed and shifted his weight in his chair. “I am happy to call you however you like, Irulan. And if you’d like to rewrite our strange childhood courtship into a strange friendship of imprisoned adults, well, I am clearly not going anywhere.”

“Thank you, Feyd-Rautha. I will come visit again. Is there anything I should request for you? I don’t think anyone would object to your having a serving-girl join you on occasion. A sparring partner is harder; they’d have to be trusted to not try and kill you. Executing your would-be assassins would be such a bad look for everyone, you understand. But perhaps imported, along with my retinue?”

“Your efforts are appreciated. Could you, perhaps,” here, Feyd looked at his coffee, almost finished, and wondered at what exactly he would ask. “Could you perhaps ask your husband to visit? Be a man and face his actions.”

“I don’t think he’d fuck you, if that’s what you’re after.”

It was Feyd’s turn to laugh. “You underestimate Harkonnen seduction.”

“Well excuse me,” Irulan responded playfully. “You’ll have to tell me how it goes.”

“Not a detail spared.” The suggestiveness in his expression was excessively parodic, and Irulan merely rolled her eyes.

“I will see what I can do. Thank you for joining me for coffee.”

Irulan motioned for the table to be cleared and stood to leave. Feyd found himself escorting her the few meters to the door.

Alone in his room again, Feyd wondered at a world in which soft, lovely women like Irulan were ignored for the likes of the hard, unamicable Fremen bitch. He could understand having two instead of one, but if one were to choose, Paul had chosen wrong. If Irulan had married Feyd, he’d have her three times a day. Perhaps he’d ask Paul for permission to do just that, if he ever came to visit. And perhaps he’d try anyway.

The pursuit of one woman was hardly hedonism, but it might have to do for now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> About halfway through editing this, I realized this was me processing the fact that I am, as the youths say, "bored in the house and I'm in the house bored." I miss my syllabus-week hedonism. 
> 
> I had an interesting time with Feyd. He's clearly a little fucked up, but capable of geniality. I think he likes Irulan as much as he's capable of liking anyone. Which is hopefully more as time goes on. I haven't decided what else I think happens in this particular canon divergence.
> 
> I hope I didn't get too many details wrong. I'm pretty sure we don't know if Irulan and Feyd ever met, but it makes sense for him to have been a candidate for her hand, and I imagine that comes with formal meetings and the like. Let me know if I got anything wrong and I'll see if I can go back and edit!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I still think this is rated T but warnings for Feyd's increased vulgarity. I'd say it's canon-typical references to sexuality, but fair warning.

To Feyd’s general dismay, he was discovering that when one has genuinely done nothing for weeks, the occasional appointment feels like a full schedule. What would have been a lazy day—a morning fuck, an hour or two of training, an inadequate cheops game—left him longing for some unstructured solitude. Not that he was ungrateful for Irulan’s gifts (the girl, the sparring partner, the cheops board); he had merely grown accustomed to the perpetual companionship of his own thoughts, and felt somewhat disconnected when he couldn’t retreat into them entirely.

His thoughts these days were often of the time before the reemergence of Paul Atreides as some fabled Muad’Dib, during Rabban’s conservatorship of Arrakis, when victory had seemed so close at hand that its inevitability made them blind to any other option. How sure he had felt in those days, of his position as na-Baron, of his success in the arena, of his future, positioned so perfectly on the most powerful planet in the Empire. He had a somewhat-unbidden recollection that a mere six months ago, he had received an invitation to the Princess Irulan’s birthday celebration, with the implication of a more serious suit. That would have been next month.

Ever since the Princess’s—Empress’s?—visit a week and a half ago, Feyd had developed a somewhat morbid fascination with her and her marriage. She had become the primary subject of his sketches, usually in some tawdry state of undress. He varied her disposition regarding her lurid situation: sometimes indignant and affronted, othertimes reveling in lasciviousness, ravenous for what her husband was apparently denying her. Most frequently, she was comically clueless, bug-eyed and babyish, surprised at the most basic sexual knowledge, at the fact of her desirability and at her own capacity for pleasure. It was counter to reality, he knew, given her Bene Gesserit training, but naïve virgin Princess was such an easy trope.

It was this comical angle which characterized his favorite collection of prurient sketches. Having learned the literal meaning of Muad’Dib, and having had a good laugh at it, he had drawn a few grotesque mouse-man caricatures. While he had enjoyed depicting Muad’Dib’s demise in the jaws of a Corrino lion or on the horns of a Harkonnen ram, the best use of this caricature was fucking an amazed Irulan, her mouth wide in surprise. _Who knew being an Empress would involve such depravity?_ she could be thinking. Or perhaps, _who knew I would enjoy it so much?_

He was touching up the latest in this series—Irulan’s eyes squeezed shut in uncharted bliss while her mouse-husband stuck his snout up her skirt—when a servant announced her arrival. He hastily stowed away his work. He wasn’t quite ashamed of it, per se, but he wasn’t sure she’d get the joke. It was a joke after all, and mostly pointed at her dear husband. Honestly, it was a shame that real-Irulan didn’t get to experience all the pleasure that caricature-Irulan did.

Irulan entered accompanied by two women who must have been part of her imported retinue: hydrated faces with unstained eyes, hands tucked away in richly-dyed sleeves. This would have been their fourth day on Arrakis, and their discomfort was plain, though surprisingly—or at least newly—unshared by their mistress.

A week and a half later, reality had begun to set in; Irulan no longer wore the high-collared cloak, and this green dress was sleeveless, held up by a bodice so stiff with card that it might as well be armor. Feyd noted the precise way her necklace fell over her collarbones, the pendant sitting exactly at the midpoint between the bottom of her throat and the top of her dress. Oh, that was a microcosm of nobility. To have women who needed to move so little that their necklaces could be placed.

“Princess.” Feyd stood and inclined his head.

Irulan tilted her head and smiled with an artificial touch of confusion. “Baron. Are we on title-basis again?”

He gestured to her ladies. “Call it caution in mixed company, Your Highness.”

“I see. Well, if I may present Kalfa Nafiya and Lady Berengaria, come to Arrakis among my companions. Ladies, this is the Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, a childhood…friend.”

As appropriate formalities were exchanged, Feyd evaluated the women. Nafiya seemed old enough to have been a young governess of an adolescent Irulan, or perhaps a favored courtiere of her father, with dark eyes which disclosed the nervousness of her smile. Berengaria, on the other hand, was hardly old enough to be called a Lady, and she stared with the concentration of comprehensive analysis, no effort of pleasantness. A child-mentat? A Bene Gesserit reject? Unnerving, either way.

“They will not stay for my visit, but I do hate to always walk the palace halls alone.” The remark doubled as an instruction, and the women made their exit to wait outside the doors. Irulan and Feyd waited in silence—Irulan valiantly keeping a straight face as Feyd showed just exactly how highly he thought of them.

“Well, well, Irulan, you seem to have made some nice friends. You hardly need to visit me anymore.”

Irulan rolled her eyes. “Don’t be like that.”

“No, I mean it!” Feyd grinned. “Your old needlework instructor and Wensicia’s least-favorite friend. What more could I possibly provide?”

“Nafiya helped my language training, actually. A conversation partner once I left Wallach IX.”

“And the Lady Berengaria?”

“Josifa’s least-favorite friend.”

Feyd laughed and Irulan proudly smirked.

“On the subject of your utility, though,” Irulan said. “If you don’t mind, not all my gifts were purely selfless.”

She walked over to the cheops board on what had functioned as their coffee table. “As you may have discovered, Arrakis is wanting in distinguished players, and I haven’t convinced my ladies that I’d rather lose than watch them feign mistakes. Join me for a game, Baron?” she turned, swishing her skirts behind her dramatically.

He bowed in response, with old fashioned flourishes as though he were three times his age. “At your pleasure, Princess.”

Yesterday, Feyd had beat himself in twenty-five moves (pitiful on his part), and so the board was cleared. He and Irulan began the work of set-up.

“On the subject of gifts, I really must thank you for your efforts, and for your taste.” He let his tongue flit over his bottom lip, subtle enough to be excusable, but prominent enough that it was clear what he meant.

“I had a surprisingly easy time acquiring her. Only half the volunteers were looking for an opportunity to kill you.”

Feyd was somewhat taken by surprise, having not though this a voluntary service. It made sense, though; Irualn was right to scan for danger. “And the other half? Inspired with insatiable lust at the thought of fucking a gladiator?”

“Something like that. Perhaps inspired by misguided fantasies of upward mobility by means of reproductive consequence.”

Feyd scoffed. “Upward mobility? Honored concubine of a prisoner?”

“Of a baron!”

“Of a deposed baron.”

“I asked for pretty girls, not intelligent ones. Anyway, you have no cause to worry; I’ve seen to it that she is regularly and unknowingly fed contraceptives.”

Irulan’s hand was idling on the last piece in the box—a black knight—and she seemed briefly distracted, though she quickly came back when Feyd placed his hand on hers.

“The piece, Princess.”

“Why, yes.” She plucked a white rook from the board and brought them both behind her back. “Right or left?”

“Left.”

She held out the black knight. “How fitting.”

He gestured to her rook, hardly a different shade than her cream-colored hand. “Toi aussi. Commençons?”

Irulan smiled sweetly and moved a pawn to e₁4, which Feyd met at e₁6. Irulan moved to d₁4, Feyd d₁5, and they comfortably progressed through O’Mahl’s variation of the French defense. Once Irulan moved her bishop to f₂6, and Feyd captured her leftmost knight, the game began to slow.

“Speaking of,” Feyd began, as Irulan contemplated her next move.

Pawn to b₂1. “Speaking of?”

“I understand it’s been a little over a month since your wedding.”

“Ah. Speaking of reproductive consequence.” The heat obscured any blush she might have sported, but Feyd guessed her coolness was mostly Bene Gesserit training doing its part. “No, it appears that the formalities were in vain.”

“Should I be sorry to hear that?”

“The Bene Gesserit certainly are.”

Feyd was glad to have cheops as an excuse for not immediately responding. He had been merely curious, and the seriousness of the situation was heavier than he had bargained for. Knight to c₁6? Pawn to e₂4? His queen must begin her ascent soon.

“It’s—” Irulan started.

Feyd looked up. Despite the persistent heat, Irulan’s arms were wrapped around herself. Her brow was furrowed and she chewed at her lip, Bene Gesserit mask abruptly discarded. Feyd silently regarded her, committing to memory the upward curve of her nose, the purpled tint of her eyelids.

She met his gaze. “We are friends now, aren’t we?”

“Yes, Irulan.”

Irulan weighed this, looking away again. “It’s…it’s a relief, in a way. I’ve learned I was more nervous about motherhood than I thought, but,” she paused, and finished quietly, “it’s frightening, too.”

Feyd nodded, wondering by whom she was particularly frightened. Surely Paul and his woman— _Chani_ her name was—preferred Irulan childless. Was it the Bene Gesserit? Her father? Or something less tangible: public opinion, or uncertainty, or existential purposelessness?

“I am sorry for bringing it up.”

Irulan shrugged, looking almost juvenile. “You only meant to inquire after my wellbeing.”

It was a generous assumption on her part, and Feyd took it with a gracious nod. He wished he could assure her, but everything he thought of rang false or bromidic.

“Your turn.” She had donned a smile which did not reach her somewhat-watery eyes.

“Ah, yes, of course.” Impulsively, he brought his queen to the second tier.

Irulan scoffed theatrically. “Mind that you don’t fall into traps of excessive verticality, Baron.” She quickly captured a forgotten rook.

“Shit,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “I’m sure there’s a metaphor there.”

“My father taught me to be wary of reading a cheops game too closely for politics.”

“A wise man.” Feyd wondered if Atreides shared the same wariness. Best not to mention him, though.

Truly, seeing how quickly and completely Irulan had lost composure at the thought of her life here, Feyd was beginning to hate Paul on a more personal level. He already despised the man for being Atreides, for representing old-aristocracy snobbery and self-congratulatory morality, and of course he hated him for the humiliation he had inflicted on House Harkonnen. But these were old family disputes, and Feyd had wanted his uncle dead anyway. 

Being imprisoned here on Arrakis, though, Feyd saw how Paul’s faults were truly in the man himself. Where was the moral high ground in keeping your blood enemy alive but not supplying him with a purpose? Where was the compassion in fucking your wife once, leaving her to agonize over whether it would have been worse to bear a child conceived so heartlessly or to fail in the task she was raised for? Oh-so-better than Harkonnen hedonism, hm?

Over the course of the game, Feyd did his best to lighten Irulan’s spirits. He mentioned that he hadn’t forgotten about her birthday next month, and they reminisced on a few parties they had both attended. She told him about the shortcomings of the five women she had imported, and Feyd teased her with lurid implications they both knew were false. He lost himself slightly, caught up in the challenge of making her laugh.

It wasn’t his best game of cheops, certainly, but he had felt he had been doing pretty well: his queen never more than a tier behind Irulan’s, and his knight keeping her king trapped. He was caught off-guard when he returned to the board, glasses of water for them both, and she sported a self-satisfied smirk.

“Check.”

“No!”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“My bishop to h₁2. You have to move your king to tier 2, probably c₂7. Unless you bring your queen down all six tiers to knock out my bishop.”

“Fuck. My knight can't get to that square. And your damn pawn...”

Feyd drummed his fingers on the table a few times, and took a sip of the water. If he brought the queen down, he’d lose that race, surely, but to bring his king to tier two put it only two moves away from her rook, and his knight could hardly corner her king in that time.

He sighed and moved his king to c₂7.

Irulan captured a pawn on tier four, weakening his defense of his queen.

“You bitch!” Feyd exclaimed, laughing in disbelief. “How dare you!”

Irulan laughed, loud and bright, her smile taking up her whole face. “Oh, I’ve missed this!”

Feyd noticed he shared her grin, and when they made eye contact, he felt his cheeks grow warm. He looked back to the board, shaking his head and trying to refocus.

He brought his king back to c₁8.

“Oh, well you’ve lost now.”

“Will you explain this one, too?”

“Hiirat Toriin lost this way, too, so you’re in good company. But see, if my pawn moves to d₁7, you’re in check, but you won’t be able to move to b₁8 on account of my bishop, and my rook on d₂3 will keep you from d₁8.”

“Even if I move to c₁7? And bring my queen to knock out your bishop?”

“Moving out of check will buy me the turns to reach tier nine.”

“Show me.”

“You have to forfeit before I touch your pieces.”

Feyd opted out of making a double-entendre of the remark, and merely offered his hand in surrender. “The game is yours, Princess.”

She smiled and shook.

“Now.” She swiftly demonstrated Feyd’s predetermined defeat, and handed him his own king.

“Wow, Irulan. I must congratulate you, truly. A game well-won.”

“A game well-played by both parties, Baron. I… I have not enjoyed an afternoon on Arrakis more than this one.”

“Nor I,” Feyd replied, with utter sincerity.

“If you don’t mind,” Irulan said, “I would like to be a more frequent visitor. I have been informed that I will have work, as a council member, but my evenings are always free.”

“I would welcome your company,” Feyd said. “And you have to show me how you did that.”

After Irulan departed, Feyd felt restless again. He paced the room a few times, but as usual, this only emphasized his feeling of being trapped. Sighing, he sat down and brought out his drawings.

He scowled, unamused by his own joke. They were brutish in their cruelty, and flung insult indiscriminately, but more problematic was their inaccuracy. There was nothing of Irulan in this ditsy little pin-up whore. No, Irulan’s imprisonment was far less lurid, and rather tragic. And moreover, she had demonstrated just how much there was in her pretty little head. The only humor here was the general amusement to be had at bestiality, and frankly Feyd was tired of it.

He thought of burning the set, but dismissed this idea as melodramatic self-indulgence. He folded them and tucked them in the bottom of the desk drawer. 

He brought out a blank sheet and started mapping a new composition—the cheops board here, the flounce of her skirt on the other side of the table, the angle of the light from the window—but found his little fit over his caricatures hadn’t cured his mood. Cursing to himself, he sighed and called for a guard to deliver his female companion.

“On your knees,” he sighed, resigned. As he lost himself in familiar pleasure, he did his best not to think of smooth golden hair, or clarion laughter, or how that might have just been the happiest afternoon of his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who watched The Queen's Gambit in 24 hours!
> 
> Full disclosure, the chess here makes about 50% sense. I didn't bother coming up with gameplay rules for cheops, but I think if one were to, the positions here would work? The subscript refers to the tier, the letter and number combinations are usual chess coordinates. The French Defense is a real opener, and the names are pulled from the Dune Encyclopedia entry for Cheops. If there are gameplay rules, let me know!
> 
> I didn't think I'd be writing more in this canon-divergence, or that it would become heterosexual pair-the-spares. But I think it works? We live in interesting times. 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading; I appreciate it so very much! <3


	3. Chapter 3

Irulan was late, and Feyd was annoyed. He wasn’t quite within his rights to be, he knew. They had no formal agreement; she had made no promises or even plans. But for the past two weeks, she had regularly come to visit at three hours to mid-night, and stayed for two. It was now hardly more than an hour until mid-night. In his frustration, he kicked his chair halfway across the room, and yet unsatisfied, punched the bedpost until he was pretty sure his knuckles would bruise.

This was a dangerous frustration, he knew. He recognized it from his childhood and adolescence: the slight tremble in his hands, the heady disconnectedness. It was the same feeling at being corrected or dismissed, at the condescension of Uncle Vladimir, or the disdain of Piter. It was usually safest to sit still and seethe silently, but it wasn’t sustainable. If he didn’t do something about it—go for a run, torture a gladiator, hold ice in his hands until he lost feeling—it would settle into a restless emptiness from which it would take days to emerge.

He had been flirting with this emptiness for days now, staving it off with sex, a new art project, and apparently Irulan’s visits. Fuck. He heard Piter’s voice in his head: _If something can’t be fixed, the fact of its brokenness must cease to be a problem_.

He sighed, and placed his chair back at the desk.

What could have been the beginnings of self-pitying shame were cut off by surprise at a knock on the door, and then by something approaching wonder as Irulan cautiously let herself in. As usual, she carried a sack with her notebooks and research, and as usual, she wore the heavy Corrino cloak she had worn on her first visit, though now appropriate for the desert night cold.

Unusually, her golden-blonde hair was unbound, cascading in slightly-damp waves around her face and down to her elbows. She wore no tiara, nor other jewelry. Indeed, under her cloak she wore only a simple flannel nightgown and knitted stockings. As Feyd met her apologetic glance, he swallowed, enchanted by how vulnerable she looked.

“I’m so sorry to be by so late; I should have sent word earlier,” Irulan began, speaking quickly. “I just…I’m very sorry. I can leave if you like, but I thought I’d at least explain myself. You don’t look well; are you alright?”

“ _I’m_ fine, how are _you_?” Indeed, being presented with a flustered, underdressed Irulan temporarily banished Feyd’s self-inflicted concerns.

“Me?” She looked down at her stockinged feet and laughed. “Oh. Yes, I’m alright. Dinner was very stressful, so I took a bath and washed my hair. Everyone already thinks I’m a waste of water, so why not? Well, except that I should have told you.”

“I am sorry to have missed your bath.”

Irulan shot him a look. “Would you like me to stay or not?” 

“An unaccompanied Princess arrives at my door in her nightgown—who am I to turn her away?”

“A maid will be over in a few minutes with tea,” Irulan said, as a correction if not a warning. “I hope you don’t mind, but I’m already sick of coffee.”

Feyd noted that this meant that Irulan had known he would not turn her away. He was surprised to find that he felt pleased to be known in such a way. He was glad she knew he wanted her around.

“At your pleasure, Princess.” He gestured for her to fully enter the room.

“Are you sure you’re fine?” She walked over and held her hand to his forehead. “You look a little ill.”

He brought her hand down, and indulged himself a moment of holding on to it—small and delicate within his own. “Yes, I’m fine. I guess I’m not sleeping very well.”

“Bad dreams?”

He shrugged and pulled the plush bench back for her to sit. She was right; it had been a few days since he had woken up well-rested, rather than in a cold sweat, the ghost-feeling of the Baron’s heavy hands still on his shoulders, or the echo of Piter’s snide voice in his ears. “You say dinner was stressful? More than usual?”

She regularly came by after dinner, so Feyd knew that it was often a bit of an ordeal for Irulan. As Paul’s wife she was required to sit by his side, but she was often excluded from conversation, as she was unfamiliar with the topics at hand. Very sensibly, statecraft had been banned from dinner-table talk, but that left her with nothing to offer. Additionally, though Paul’s baby sister had inherited lifetimes of knowledge, she had apparently not inherited tact, and it had taken Chani’s objections to her behavior to get her to stop humiliating Irulan.

Irulan sighed as she began taking out her notebooks on the table. “The Lady Jessica is making plans to leave Arrakis. Nobody likes it but nobody can truly object.”

“Oh.” This was a surprise. “Back to Caladan?”

“Mmhm.” Irulan put her head in her hands for a second, but sighed and quickly resumed setting up her workspace.

She was working on histories. “ _Memoires, really_ ,” she had said. “ _But a Princess’s memoires are oftentimes history_.” But they were indeed more than memoires. She consulted with family trees and imperial charters and other such documents. Feyd found such work tedious; when she pointed out an interesting fact in her research, he had to perform a certain level of excitement. He did like when she read her own writing aloud though. She had a way of molding facts into an engaging story, and she spoke in a lovely, almost melodic tone.

The servant came with tea, and Feyd thought about what to say next. Irulan had said that Jessica was not fond of her, but her departure might tip a precarious social dynamic into hostility. He wondered, “Is she taking her daughter along?”

Irulan laughed humorlessly. “Well that’s the question, isn’t it? Jessica says Alia belongs on Arrakis, and Alia is indeed loath to leave. Paul says that _I_ can look after her, even though I did _not_ volunteer to do _any_ such thing. Now, Alia _insists_ that she can raise herself, but then spills juice down her front, which makes it _very_ hard to take her seriously. Chani suggests that _Harah_ can look after her, which is _fine_ , except she says it without looking at me, because she _clearly_ intends to slight me, or at _least_ imply that I’m incapable, which I am, but that’s a _lot_ for a woman to just _take_ at the dinner table, so I ask if Chani intends to farm her _own_ children off to Harah, which was reckless but I just couldn’t stop myself. She pretended to not understand the expression. _Bitch_.”

She said the last word under her breath, and though Feyd assumed it was directed at Chani, there was enough deadness in her eyes it could’ve been directed at herself.

“Did your own mother raise you?” He didn’t know what made him ask the question. It surprised him as much as it did her.

“I guess. I was sent to school, of course, but only once I was six, and not for the full fourteen years. They didn’t like me much. Neither did my mother, really.” Irulan’s brow furrowed, as much an expression of concentration as of concern. “But she raised me. Taught me to read. Picked out my dresses, brushed my hair. Tucked me into bed. When Chalice was born we got a governess, but she was never a complete replacement. What about you?”

“I don’t remember my mother. The Baron essentially bought me from her before I was two years standard.”

“I’m sorry.”

Feyd shrugged. “Nothing to be sorry about. I don’t know what I missed.” He was a little uncomfortable with this line of conversation.

“So did you have a governess?”

“I had a series of nurses until I was self-sufficient enough to be under the tutelage of Piter de Vries.”

“Oh.” Irulan’s horror was apparent, which annoyed Feyd a little.

“He looked after me well.”

“Oh. Well. I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to… This conversation took a dark turn.” She forced a laugh.

Feyd forced a smile. They each took a sip of their tea. Irulan opened a book.

Feyd retreated to his drawing desk—another gift from Irulan. He was working on a gift for her; he had another week and a half until her birthday. He didn’t have any illusion that he’d be invited, but he’d like to think he would be, if Irulan had any say in the matter. Technically, he had once had an invitation. Though that would have been issued by her father. Or perhaps rather her mother. He wondered whose responsibility his own birthday fetes had been.

The portrait of Irulan he had begun in agitation after their first cheops game was nearly finished, colors and everything. In the evenings, he observed her at work and practiced her expressions, and the next day he would make his serving girl stand where Irulan had been standing, so he could get the lighting and such right. She was a little shorter, but it wasn’t much of a problem. More annoying was how she clearly thought this meant she was more than a body to be fucked. A body to be sketched was hardly “more than.” Once she had even presumed to greet him.

It wasn’t that Feyd disliked having a relationship with his sexual partners. Quite the opposite, really. He had been on strangely good terms with many of those in the Harkonnen pleasure-houses. He knew some men liked their partners crying, but though he could admit the fun in pushing people around, it was much better if everyone was happy at the end. That wasn’t the point, anyway. The point was that however pretty and docile this girl was, she was a gift from Irulan, and that made things more complicated than he was willing to sort out.

“Um, Feyd-Rautha?” He was spared from unpacking this by Irulan asking, “Did you know you were to wed Paul, were he born a girl?”

Feyd laughed. “Yes, actually. It was something my uncle liked to hold over Piter’s head. Piter had apparently thought he’d be a girl, but when he wasn’t, we got to weasel our way out of some contracts. Not what was promised, or whatever. Not sure who set up the betrothal in the first place, though, as we were so keen to get out of it.” 

“The Bene Gesserit,” Irulan provided. “Apparently.”

Feyd set his pencil down. “What for?”

Irulan hesistated, “Oh, to end the feud, probably. And who doesn’t like a wedding?”

Feyd rolled his eyes. She wasn’t telling him everything. “And what else?”

She chewed her lip a little. “And you’d be a good genetic match.”

Well, that would explain why the contracts were dissolvable. He had wondered why, occasionally, why he hadn’t ever been in suit meetings with the Atreides heir, if it had once been on the table. Apparently, the people who had wanted it had very particular requirements for matches. He smirked, thinking, as he had before, that it was a bit of a shame. Disasters had the potential to be enjoyed.

Looking over at Irulan, he saw that she still looked a little shaken. He couldn’t figure out why. What was a path not taken?

“You look a little ill,” he imitated her.

“I once said that we lived similarly,” she began. “Apparently we live for the same reason.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I’m a concession to the Bene Gesserit. As long as I might bear Paul’s children, they will support him.”

Feyd nodded. He knew this. He moved back to sit next to her.

“And maybe once upon a time the Bene Gesserit gave up on weaving your genetics into the Atreides line. But the situation has changed in recent years.”

His stomach dropped, and he felt the strange disconnectedness from before. “He wants me to fuck his sister.”

“Your delicacy is noted. But no, actually, he doesn’t. He wants the Bene Gesserit to back him. And they’re already a little upset with him, particularly upset with his mother, really—oh I shouldn’t be telling you all this—basically, if there’s a possibility that he would let the Bene Gesserit… _match_ you to Alia, they are less likely to interfere with him. I’ll remind you that Alia is four; so you have at the very least ten years, and probably more like fifteen.”

“Until I have to fuck his sister.”

“Until this becomes relevant. Believe me, if Alia doesn’t want you, it’ll be entirely off the table.”

“That wasn’t true for you.”

They had been looking in each other’s eyes for a while, but at this, they both seemed to realize how close they were—on the bench, they were a mere few inches apart. He swallowed and she blinked, but they didn’t look away.

“If it comes to that, I’m sure you’ll handle yourself quite well. Far better than I did.”

“Oh, Irulan.”

Her face scrunched up as she fought off tears, still sitting poised, hands demurely in her lap. “I hate it here,” she sobbed out.

“That’s diplomatic.”

She laughed; a little giggle that degenerated into sobs. “I want to go home. I want to have my birthday party with all my sisters, and I want to complain to Chalice about your dancing, and I want my father to tell me he’s proud of me, and I never want to think about water again.”

He reached behind her and pulled her close. She leaned her head against his chest. “I’m sure we can arrange for at least one of those things.”

They sat silently for a while, as Irulan calmed her crying. Feyd could feel his own heartbeat in his ears. He was afraid to move, worried that the tiniest shift in his hand placement would scare her, or at least bring her to her senses.

“You know I can’t stay,” she said quietly. 

“I know,” he replied.

They didn’t move.

Eventually, she stood and took a deep breath. She collected her things, not looking at him. When she walked away, he reached out and grabbed her hand. She froze at first, but then squeezed it in response, and he let her go.

As Feyd lay in bed, staring up at the canopy, Piter’s voice returned to his head: _The simplest way to manage one’s appetites is to sate them_. He huffed and shifted positions. This was sound advice for generic appetites—food, drink, sex, violence. It was complicated for specific appetites. How could one sate the desire for a specific food, if it weren’t available, or a specific woman, if she didn’t, couldn’t, want you back?

He supposed Piter had never envisioned a position where Feyd could not acquire any food he desired, and had not conceived that wanting a specific woman might mean more than wanting her in your bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh oh oh... are either of them going to process this? are they going to be okay? (are either of them going to realize that Paul also doesn't want any of this?) I like the Bene Gesserit as much as the next girl but their policies on consent are rather questionable... 
> 
> Some minor world-building remarks: I wasn't sure if Arrakis had a 24-hour day, so I don't mention exact times. Also I just decided that people (of any gender) don't routinely wear makeup, because I don't, and because I didn't want Feyd to comment on Irulan's lack thereof post-bath. Let it just be for fancy things! Lastly, I decided the main reason for Paul and Feyd to not be married would be the feud, rather than Paul's (perceived) gender. It's 10,000 AG; we don't have time for homophobia. 
> 
> I also don't know things about art, so I assume Feyd's doing things in a sensible way, and that it's taking a reasonable amount of time. If it's too long spent on one thing, we can just imagine he has other projects, or if it's not enough, we can just imagine that it's a simpler project than I describe. If anyone wants to be a consultant let me know haha. 
> 
> Thank you for reading!! I hope you're having as many feelings as I am. <3


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